Meals for the Week of February 15, 2021

ZERO meal planning and prep went into last week’s meals.

My patience, mood and energy greatly suffered from it. In a world where we are told to eat less and move more — it is complete bullshit. It is not that simple, for everyone!

When we don’t consume enough food to meet our energy and stress demands for the day we are left in an energy deficit which for most of us means you are pumping out stress hormones in order to stay afloat. This leaves you irritable, impatient, moody, and on edge. So although I did get meals together, they were on the light side and I definitely paid the price.

Oh and the little one was home with me all week since he had a runny nose so that’s another reason. MAMAS DO NOT CUT CALORIES! You need your energy to keep up with the energizer bunnies!

 

Note on leftovers- most will tell you leftovers in the fridge are good for 4 days. It is a great rule of thumb! In our household, we inspect and smell the food, if all looks good we still eat it – but it is always reheated. You do what you are comfortable with!

 

Week of meals for February 1, 2021

Our family: 2 adults, 1 toddler

Scope: Breakfast, lunch, and dinner (what is shown for breakfast and lunch is what I eat, I am not tracking my husband’s meals – but the goal every week is to use what we have so there is no waste)

This is going to be a quick run down of what we do. If you have questions or want to know specifics let me know in the comments. If I get enough demand I will start tracking things and sharing them.

 

Monday: 

Breakfast – Broccoli slaw omelet! Bubba loves this and it is an easy way to get broccoli in him and a vegetable in at breakfast.

Recipe- Heat a skillet on medium heat with a tablespoon of duck fat. Add a hefty handful of broccoli slaw (I buy a bag of organic broccoli slaw at Trader Joe’s for $1.99!). Let that cook / reduce for a few minutes. Meanwhile, scramble 2 duck eggs, grate a garlic clove and a small knob of ginger, and add a tablespoon of coconut aminos to the eggs. Clear a little hole in the slaw and add another tablespoon of duck fat. Let melt and mix slightly with slaw. Pour egg mixture into skillet and tilt as needed to spread it out as evenly as possible. After a few minutes, the middle won’t be as watery/jiggly, flip. Cook for an additional 2 minutes and move to a plate.

Lunch – Struggle bus! Toasted a slice of homemade sourdough bread and topped it off with half an avocado, sea salt, and sauerkraut.

Dinner – Made roasted butternut squash soup. What I did:

• Roughly chopped butternut squash, parsnips, and carrots. Roasted them in the oven at 400⁰ convection for 45 minutes.
• When ready to make the soup, chopped an onion and garlic. Sautéed them in a pot over medium high heat on the stove.
• Added the roasted vegetables along with ground garlic and ginger, smoked paprika, cinnamon, thyme, and sea salt.
• Added a can of coconut milk
• Added homemade broth, enough to just cover everything.
• With a hand blender, pureed everything together. Then reheated on a simmer on the stove.
• Meanwhile, in a skillet over medium heat, removed Italian sausage from the casings and cooked through. Remove to a bowl when done.
• Added sliced cremini mushrooms and sautéed. Remove to a bowl when done.
• Added a little bit of duck fat and turned up the heat to medium high heat. Added quartered Brussels sprouts. Let sit for a few minutes, did not touch, then flipped / tossed as best I could to get the other side browned.
• Served the Italian sausage, mushrooms, and Brussels sprouts over the soup

 

Tuesday:

Breakfast – Broccoli slaw omelet

Lunch – Leftover butternut squash soup and all the toppings.

Dinner – Made fajitas! This was on the whim and last minute but turned out amazing. Recipe:

• Heated a skillet on the stove over medium heat. Add a little extra virgin olive oil.
• 1 large yellow onion, sliced. Add to skillet, add a pinch of sea salt, mix around. Reduce heat to low medium. Stirring occasionally.
• 3 tri color bell peppers, sliced. Added to the skillet after the onions had been on for about 15 minutes solo. Added another pinch of sea salt, mix around. Stirring occasionally.
• Used this recipe for making sourdough discard corn tortillas (note to self, next time use less water)
• Make guacamole from a 3 avocados and mix in sea salt and ground garlic, onion, and cumin.
• Heated another skillet on the stove over medium high heat. Add duck fat to melt and heat up.
• Pat dry a flank steak, sea salt and pepper, then add to skillet. Sea salt and pepper the side up. Flip once the bottom is browned and you can see about half way up the steak is cooked. Cook for another few minutes. Remove and cover for at least 10 minutes.
• Cook the corn tortillas while the steak rests in the same skillet adding additional duck fat as needed.

 

Wednesday:

Breakfast – Made egg drop soup with 2 duck eggs. Instructions – bring broth to a boil, stir in scrambled egg yolks and grated ginger and garlic. Pour back into the bowl to serve.

Lunch – Leftover Beef and Pumpkin Chili. Check out last week’s post for details.

Dinner – Around 2pm, pulled out some frozen pork butt from the freezer and put it in the Instant Pot. Added some sea salt, pepper, and a bay leaf as well as a cup of filtered water. Set the Instant Pot on high pressure for 90 minutes. Around 4:30pm started making white rice. Once the pork was done, did a manual release, removed the pork and added a small red cabbage cut into quarters into the Instant Pot. Set it on high for 5 minutes. Served with sauerkraut.

Note: the top part of the pork butt not submerged in liquid was tough, difficult to pull apart. We put it back in the Instant Pot on high pressure for 10 minutes and easy peasy fell apart!

 

Thursday: SNOW DAY! Again…

Breakfast – Made 2 duck eggs sunny side up. Toasted a slice of homemade sourdough bread and topped it off with half an avocado. Served with half a grapefruit.

Lunch – Leftover fajitas

Dinner – Roasted 8 chicken thighs with sea salt and pepper in the oven at 375⁰ for 45 minutes. Meanwhile, chopped 2 mini cucumbers and a pint of grape tomatoes. Made brown rice fusilli pasta. Plated 2 chicken thighs with everything else and drizzled extra virgin olive oil over it all.

 

Friday:

Breakfast – Made 2 duck eggs sunny side up. Toasted a slice of homemade sourdough bread and topped it off with half an avocado. Served with half a grapefruit.

Lunch – Leftover Beef and Pumpkin Chili.

Dinner – Roasted a whole black sea bass in the oven at 425⁰ for 20 minutes. It was stuffed with 2 cloves of garlic sliced, slices of half a large lemon, and drizzled with extra virgin olive oil. Broccolini was placed on the same baking sheet around the fish, drizzled with olive oil, sea salt, and pepper. Meanwhile, we made Ramen noodles and a nut sauce to top it off (tamari, miso, peanut butter, toasted sesame oil, and fish sauce).

This was by far my favorite meal of the week!

 

Saturday:

Breakfast – Egg drop soup

Lunch – Toasted a slice of homemade sourdough bread. Meanwhile, sautéed the remaining pulled pork in a skillet on the stove over medium. Mashed half an avocado into the toast, added some arugula, the pulled pork, sliced mini cucumbers, and some salsa!

Dinner – Burger night! Sliced some sweet potatoes into sticks and cooked in the oven at 425⁰ convection for 20 minutes, tossing frequently. Sautéed the burgers on the stove over medium high-ish heat. Made a bed of arugula and spinach, added some chopped beets and extra virgin olive oil.

 

Sunday:

Breakfast – Made 2 duck eggs sunny side up. Toasted a slice of homemade sourdough bread and topped it off with half an avocado. Served with half a grapefruit.

Lunch – Reheated the leftover chicken on the stove. Meanwhile, made a salad with arugula, spinach, cucumbers, beets, and extra virgin olive oil.

Dinner – Made Well Plated’s Paleo Chili